WIND
IN THE
P38
Bautista Dominates Catalunya WorldSBK
A
lvaro Bautista (Aruba.it
Ducati) made it 11 wins from
12 starts in the 2023 WorldSBK
Championship after another
dominant performance at Catalu-
nya in Spain, May 6-7.
It looks so easy; his margins
of victory in Barcelona were
almost at his 2019 levels, but, of
course, the amazing form is the
result of a bike, team and rider,
and Bautista has to ride his bike
on the razor's edge to get it to go
quite that well.
No other Ducati except his own
teammate Michael Ruben Rinaldi
could get near him or the podium
this weekend, as they cannot ride
it the way Bautista does.
Bautista won a long first race
in hot conditions, a 10-lap sprint
with light rain halfway through and
a final 20-lap race in much cooler
track conditions than race one.
Even with 250 revs knocked
off his peak power from Friday's
free practice sessions, thanks
to new regulations, he was too
much for everyone this weekend.
The 2021 Champion, Toprak
Razgatlioglu (Pata Yamaha),
got as close to Bautista as it
was possible, with three second
places. But he was still miles off.
Bautista, Dominique Aegerter
(GRT Yamaha) and Jonathan Rea
(Kawasaki Racing Team) were the
front row riders after a red-flagged
Superpole contest, halted when
Alex Lowes fell off his Kawasaki,
and his bike was stranded too
near the racing surface.
Bautista set a new track best
with a 1:40.264 in Superpole, which
was 0.473 seconds up on second-
fastest Aegerter, and nearly half a
second faster than Rea.
The first race was also red
flagged, after three laps, when
Oliver Konig crashed his Orelac
Kawasaki. The official results
showed on the timeline that there
was then a red flag, but it was
actually the crash of Eric Granado
and him hitting the trackside
safety barriers (not the wall) that
actually caused the red flag.
This was as close as
anyone got to Alvaro
Bautista (1) all weekend
long in Catalunya.
PHOTOS: GOLD & GOOSE
